With 20th Century, we can see infinitely many writers, scientists, and psychologists who work and write about how sex is repressed in modern society. Even the founder of psychotherapy, Freud, based almost the whole theory on sexual repression. We can’t argue about having the same sexual experiences as ancient people. However, the real question we should ask ourselves is whether the change in sexual experience can be explained simply by repression or if there is beyond it.

Privacy and Sex: Marriage in Japanese Culture and Western Obsession

The world is an experimental environment with different parameters in each region. To understand the repression of sex, Japan region is the best country to look at. Somehow, someway more than half of the partners in Japan have either none or close to zero sexual relationships in one year. We quickly assume that Japanese culture has the most repressed sexuality, which is not accurate. Manga and anime drawings of female characters fetishise female body parts sexually for modern society.

They use big boobs, big eyes, white and porcelain skin with childish voices, and, most disturbingly, the sexualisation of teenagers in high school, like in ecchi, is more than anything else. If sexuality is repressed, how is manga culture not a shame or societal exclusion factor? How do they have hostess bars and cafes, or, in other words, upgraded Hooters everywhere in the big cities?

We should find different reasons to explain the situation in Japan since, logically, sexual repression in society causes a lack of explicit content in pop culture. (see Middle Eastern pop culture) If we look deeply at the perception of sex in Japan, for many couples in Japan, westernised cheating (having sexual intercourse with other people) is acceptable. We know that pride and male dominancy are two of the most vital aspects of Japanese family culture, so how is cheating normalised in their relationships?

The answer is simple: the wife’s role is to be a manager in the house and for their children, and the girlfriend’s role is to be a private hostess. Hence, it is given that males have the right to have two female figures in their lives to perform two “roles” of separate gender role definitions. So, it becomes evident that the sexuality of men is not repressed. However, they eliminate female sexuality and their sexual desires.

The figure of ‘being a mom’ is split into two separate ‘objects’ ( mom and hostess ); this is to increase the male mental dominance in the culture. This tendency towards female objectification implies one reason for the characteristics of female characters in manga and anime.

When we look at the Western culture, there is a surprising conflict about how they are obsessed with blessing the Japanese anime culture regardless of its content showing female objectification and other unnecessary showcases of the sexuality of teenage girls in animes; these are not unclear for the western audience in contrast as clear as daylight in the summer.

This becomes a reason why they do not like Middle Eastern culture. They are even okay with genocide because we are ( I am Middle Eastern ) the ‘bad’ guys regarding the sexual repression of females and non-straight people.

Porn Evolution and Hypocrisy

We should examine porn evolution in the 20th and 21st centuries to understand the reason for the hypocrisy in the second section. I don’t want to argue about why porn was created and its general effects on individuals, but looking at the evolution of pornographic content is a good idea. In the early ages of the porn industry, thanks to less content and accessibility, the content and plot of porn movies and magazines were more artistic. It included sexual stories, and even the plot of erotic/pornographic films was much more crucial and valuable for consumers.

People tended to go to theatres to watch erotic movies like non-erotic movies, and they hid their sexual magazines to read again and again. The advent of technological and productional improvements, like many other industries, impacted the consumption of porn as well. It became more accessible and provided infinite content.

Such mass production has eliminated the creation of plots for porn; this further turns them into shorts or reels with mere sexual images, and this data attacks our brains. An example of data attacks is similar to Japanese manga culture; we can find illustrations from the porn culture in the background of different contents, such as series, movies or even advertisements.

Even Kardashian’s reality shows, female athletes and their representation in ads ( Angel Reese, Serena Williams ), or the portrayal of successful females now seem more like pornographic images than their empowered images. These successes have become used for pornographic usage ( the first example is Marilyn Monroe and many more, such as Finland’s prime minister, etc.) in real life. In a nutshell, the similarities between porn culture and Japanese manga culture cause the sympathy of Western people towards mangas and animes even though they are explicitly misogynist.

After realising the hypocrisy, we should examine the sexual repression in Western Culture, whether it is a real sexual repression or more like a female repression in society similar to what we read in the previous paragraph for Japan. To understand the repression of sex in Western spaces, Berlin is the best region to look at because Berlin city culture is the most sexual “free” and “liberal” culture in Western society for many people.

Berliners

Berliners respond to the assumption of sexual repression by looking at sex as physical satisfaction, like doing a sport. They assume today’s social rules hinder them from having hedonistic sex with drugs. They are more open-minded and freedom supporters ( liberals ) in having sexual intercourse.

They have “normal” jobs and errands during weekdays and private free-sex lives on weekends in techno clubs or private parties to become their selves. Here comes the central conflict for them. If they are genuinely free about their sex lives, why do they have tendencies to have private spaces and be drugged to have a not repressed sexuality?

To analyse conflict, we should start with the two-sided lifestyle symbolising real repression in a capitalistic world. Even to feel an illusion of not being repressed, they need to be in work-free time while being drugged to escape reality, and most importantly, they are allowed to feel free only under one assumption: to consume more. In contemporary capitalism, one of the most repressed sides of humans is abstract emotions without hedonistic reasons, such as happiness, sadness, being in love, anger, shame, etc.

You should work and consume more regardless of your feelings and thoughts. Eliminating complexity in human emotions turns people’s minds into calculators to count consumptions to feel and secrete only dopamine and material awards rather than focusing on abstract (not consumable) feelings or being free to feel. Reels, shorts, and unlimited data attacks in minds are some of the most apparent examples of eliminating complexity in our minds.

Our brains are too busy with synthetic environmental factors, and they consume data rather than focusing on and processing what we feel or want, aside from the consumption possibilities that are easy to find nowadays. Even though we are physically repressed ( sitting on the couch, obesity, the best activity is resting after work for most of us, etc. ), we are repressed more and more emotionally. So, my question is: Are Berliners right about having hedonistic satisfaction in sex to be less sexually repressed? In other words, in today’s world, is sex only a physical activity?

The Answer

To answer this question, we should look at private space possibilities to feel free and be ourselves. Due to repression or another reason, sexual intercourse is the most conserved and private space in an individual’s life in the Western world. Besides our partners, talk about sex life is mainly a taboo or most natural privacy since our childhood ( Most parents acted like sex didn’t exist when we were children (see the stork brought you. ) )

In contemporary capitalism, we need private spaces to express our traits which were repressed or “unacceptable” for society. However, we were always eager to feel accepted and at peace with our characters. ( Unpeace in the inner self is the primary weapon for a capitalistic society, to eliminate value feelings in people and turn them into “automatons” or devalue what they want or need besides capitalistic goals. )

Sex life is the best place to create a possibility to fulfill a combination of these two needs because it is the most private space that we can share with someone who accepts us and our bodies. A healthy sex life is more than an activity and becomes a communication with fewer edges between people if they want to learn how to not repress themselves and escape society‘s expectations, especially regarding gender roles. In an ideal or utopian world, there would be a different healthy sex definition than the definition we mentioned.

However, the main problem in today’s academic or critical articles is that they act as if we live in a perfect environment for applying perfect theories. ( see discussion about Hamas and the liberation of Palestine in a utopian way ) So, we should aim to improve our sex life regarding today’s conditions, then we can create a more perfect world for us. In conclusion, I find that Berliners are partially correct about hedonistic satisfaction. Still, they miss the emotional and abstract repression of the capitalistic society.

I am neither a sexual psychologist nor have much experience in sexual life. However, I recognise that physical repression of the female body and assigning roles to fulfil unrealistic expectations or humiliating favour for males or society. Similar to Japanese manga culture, objectifying female bodies in porn, such as big body curves with tiny waists, thanks to camera angles and surgeries, the humiliating primary role for females has become a norm in society.

For example, in many people’s minds, sex is one-sided for males and being fucked is a punishment or showing dominance toward females, so they want to humiliate either their sister, who has the same position as them, or their mom, who has a higher hierarchy than them, so, the most searched term in Pornhub is step-sister or step-mom for many countries, which is also an increasing trend.

In conclusion, sexual repression hides the actual repression of people, especially for females. Many experts use sexual repression to justify male dominance against females and emotional pressure from capitalistic society. To achieve less repressed sex, we should accomplish a less repressed society in the long term. In the individualistic stage, to have an emotionally safe and free sexual life, we should allow ourselves to communicate and express the “real” us to our partner.